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Google hints at detente in China standoff

Search giant says it will give negotiations a couple of years

Google has hinted during the TED conference in California that it may soften
its stance towards China, according to reports.

Google co-founder Sergey Brin was questioned at the event on the search
giant's threat earlier this year to
pull
out of China if it has to continue censoring search results on the internet.

Brin has now said that pulling out of the country will not occur immediately,
and that he is optimistic that negotiations with China will be successful even
if it takes a couple of years.

Google made the threat to exit China after the Gmail accounts of Chinese
human rights campaigners were hacked last year.

The company has been widely praised by commentators globally for taking a
tough
stance against the Chinese internet censorship programme, especially since
it would mean a substantial loss of revenue for Google's search division.

However, since the initial threat, Google's will appears to be weakening.

Google chief executive Eric Schmidt said after the firm's fourth quarter
financial results were released that he is committed to staying in China.

Brin has now offered to build more bridges, claiming that the threat to pull
out was not because he believed that the email hacking attacks had come from the
Chinese government, but because of the deteriorating state of human rights in
the country.